7 often pondered questions answered!

We often wonder- why men are attracted to blondes or is midlife crisis a myth and find no logical answers for them. But now, seven of the most pertinent questions have been answered. Read on...

entertainmentUpdated: Dec 01, 2010 16:01 IST

ANI

There are times when one might put their foot in their mouth, but for evolutionary psychologist Satoshi Kanazawa, the expression doesn’t even begin to cover it.

The London School of Economics researcher reveals in his new book titled Ten Politically Incorrect Truths about Human Nature – just that.

He examined the 10-volume compendium The Encyclopaedia of World Cultures, which describes all human cultures known to anthropology - more than 1,500 in total, reports the Daily Mail.

Here are some of them:1. Why men like blonde bombshells

Healthy women have shiny, healthy-looking hair and blonde hair displays grey hairs less obviously than dark hair. Blonde hair also changes dramatically with age so that older women are more likely to have browner hair.

It’s also why women want to look like Barbie with a small waist, large breasts, long blond hair, and blue eyes is because it is a direct response to the reasons men want to mate with her.

2. Why most suicide bombers are Muslim

While suicide missions are not always religiously motivated, when religion is involved, it is always Muslim, says Kanazawa.

According to him, in societies where polygamy is allowed there are a necessary number of men who are unable to mate because of the simple mathematics involved.

He says this is what makes men more violent or aggressive – they are competing for a mate. He goes on to say that the idea that 72 virgins await a martyr can inspire young men in this situation to go on to become suicide bombers.

3. Men who cheat are stupid, because humans are naturally polygamous

According to Kanazawa, men have always been ''mildly polygamous''. That has changed today, however, and Dr Kanazawa explained that entering a sexually exclusive relationship is ''evolutionarily novel'' development for them.

Therefore, in the case of fidelity, men who cannot adapt and end up succumbing to temptation and cheating are likely to be more stupid.

4. What Bill Gates and Paul McCartney have in common with criminals

A theory known as the ‘age-crime curve’ says that risk-taking behaviour increases early adolescence, peaks in early adulthood, decreases through someone’s 20s and 30s, before levelling off in middle age.

Kanazawa uses the example of Paul McCartney having not written a ‘hit song in decades’ while Gates is a businessman, no longer a computer whiz kid.

He writes, “Men have had to conquer foreign lands, win battles and wars, compose symphonies, author books, write sonnets, paint cathedral ceilings, make scientific discoveries, play in rock bands, and write new computer software in order to impress women so that they will agree to have sex with them.”

5. Why the midlife crisis is a myth

Men go through their mid-life crisis only because their wives are going through one, Kanazawa declared.

When a woman reaches the menopause she can no longer reproduce and so men find themselves compelled to try and attract younger women who can.

Kanazawa claims that men who marry younger women are unlikely to have a mid-life crisis themselves because this event will not take place.

He says, “It''s not his midlife that matters; it''s hers. When he buys a shiny-red sports car, he''s not trying to regain his youth; he''s trying to attract young women to replace his menopausal wife by trumpeting his flash and cash.”

6. Liberals are more intelligent than conservatives

“It may be reasonable to infer that sharing of resources with total strangers that one has never met or is not likely ever to meet – that is, liberalism – was not part of our ancestral life,” Kanazawa said.

Liberalism may therefore be evolutionarily novel, he said.

He wrote, “They [Liberals] control the institutions because liberals are on average more intelligent than conservatives and thus they are more likely to attain the highest status in any area of (evolutionarily novel) modern life.”

7. Women are becoming more beautiful as they have more daughters

According to Kanazawa’s theory beautiful women have more children than their plainer counterparts. These daughters, once adult, also tend to be attractive and so the pattern continues.

This pattern has led to women becoming steadily more beautiful over the generations, according to the theory.